Obama and Hillary are not alone. Real history is so pesky for Leftists that they have to make it up

We should read the Financial Times column written by Cambridge historian and New American Foundation senior fellow, Anatol Lieven entitled: "Why we should fear a McCain presidency?" His intriguing answer which appears in bold print in the paper edition is:

Some of the worst 20th century catastrophes were caused by brave men with passionate sense of national mission.

Really? I was curious. Who could he mean? I could not think of an example. Apparently, neither could he. The closest he came to naming names is comparing McCain to Andrew Jackson, a highly regarded 19th century Democrat president and not a particularly scary one. He does tell us that so extreme is the McCain presidency going to be that it will make leftists look back with nostalgia at George W. Bush. Indeed, European governments should start immediately planning on "how they could either prevent a McCain administration from pursuing pyromaniac policies or, if necessary, protect Europe from the ensuing conflagration."

But why should Americans believe that as experienced and knowledgeable a warrior as John McCain would behave so irresponsibly? Because he has an ungovernable temper, Lieven answers:

"Mr McCain's policies would not be so worrying were it not for his notorious quickness to fury in the face of perceived insults to himself or his country. Even Thad Cochran, a fellow Republican senator, has said: `I certainly know no other president since I've been here who's had a temperament like that.'"

Well, let me enlighten him. World War II hero and two term president Dwight Eisenhower was another military man with a lightening temper. In her book First Mothers, Bonnie Angelo describes his mother's failure to teach him temper control. "From childhood those lightening flashes were as much a part of Ike as the contagious smile," she writes.

Biographer Carlo D'este describes instances when "he totally lost his self-control -- whether beating an apple tree with his fists as a child, banging his head against a wall when playing poor tennis, or punching his fist through the wall of a cafe." White House seamstress Lillian Rogers Parks tells how his wife Mamie lived in constant fear of his outbursts. Angelo reports that presidential aides became most familiar with a vein in his forehead which would noticeably stand out during press conference he found annoying as signaling, "Caution: high voltage temper."

That said, Eisenhower did help win World War II but did not start World War III. He, merely, ended the Korean War and presided over 8 years of relative peace and prosperity. Not a bad record for a brave honorable, if temperamental, warrior. If temperamental McCain does as well we should all be very happy.

Below is Bruce Kesler's explanation. I think he is too kind. Leading Leftists and many of their followers are just psychopaths, born defectives who are completely lacking any moral instinct. They virtually tell us so when they say: "There is no such thing as right and wrong"

It's a wonder to observers that Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton and John Kerry so blatantly -- and relatively easily revealed as otherwise -- invented their histories as heroic, exemplary and worthy of leadership.

Their formative education coincides with a post-war radical trend in historiography called leftist revisionism. Although revisions of historical understandings are a commonplace occurrence as new sources come to light, the radical left in post-war America veered into a myth that the causes of the Cold War, and of Vietnam and now Iraq, came from avaricious and racist motives and are furthered by outright mendacity and secret cabals. The structures, and confusions, of institutional decision-making with naturally murky intelligence, the requirements of national security and alliances, the value or sincerity of Western values, these are treated as excuses that purposely hide the true intents and goals.

This radical leftist revisionism, while allied with and blending easily with Marxist opposition to capitalism, is distinct in its raising of the true enemy to heroic proportions, extra-powerful individuals. This demonization of our leaders leads to the need for heroic counters. Thus, Obama, Clinton and Kerry needed to re-invent themselves, both to appear as the answer, and to convince themselves they are worthy of being the answer. Their self-invention is as false as their root interpretation of history and the workings of politics and international affairs.

Thanks to Daily Mail - The BBC would be forced to share the £3.2billion proceeds of the licence fee and scale back its dominant presence on the Internet under radical proposals by the Tories. The party also said commercial broadcasters which did not receive public money should no longer have to be politically impartial. That would pave the way for channels such as Rupert Murdoch's Fox News - which has been accused of promoting a Republican point of view at the expense of neutrality in the U.S. - to come to Britain.

I'm sure the lefties will be most upset, they still can't get over the reality that FOX News is still allowed to operate in the U.S. Good godless, what is this world coming to with all this fairness and those Conservative bastards getting a voice. And how exactly will lefties manage to survive without stealing money from taxpayers, instead having to earn it, like the rest of us! I just hope enough Britons are sick to the back teeth of their money feeding that nest of leftist vipers at the al-Beeb.

Thanks to Courier Mail - FEARS that Australian-born girls as young as three months are being flown to Africa to undergo barbaric circumcision operations have been reported to the Department of Child Safety. The Sunday Mail has learned that Family Planning Queensland has approached the State Government asking that a process be established to protect the children. The organisation fears that female genital mutilation is on the rise in Queensland with the increased number of African refugees arriving in the state in recent years.

Read the entire article and you won't find a single mention of Islam or Muslims. In case anyone just came down in the last shower, it's not Hindus or Buddhists or some other religion doing this. As a commenter to this article said [pulled now], all the countries where this is practiced and those who practice this crap are Muslim. Watch Wilder's "highly offensive" movie and he shows a small bit about female genital mutilation (FGM) in all it's disgusting reality.

Thanks to News.com.au - AUSTRALIA has added its voice to the international chorus of outrage over an anti-Islam film posted on the internet by a right wing Dutch politician. Foreign Minister Stephen Smith today said Geert Wilders' film Fitna equated Islam with acts of terror and violence and was "highly offensive".

I wonder if our foreign minister actually even saw the movie. I wonder, if he even knows or cares that this is going on in his bosses' home state? I remember a saying from a long time ago, a fool learns from his own mistakes, a wise man learns from anothers'. Well Australia, there wasn't any FGM in Queensland before, there wasn't any FGM over in Europe, no honor killings, no sharia law, there weren't any no-go zones there either. No mass car burning and ambushing of police in France a while ago. No one marching down the street telling you to 'go to hell'.

I'm sure back then there were also such folk like Stephen Smith slamming anyone who said anything negative about Islam. No threats, move along folks, nothing to see here, sing kumbaya, it's all good, shut it or else. The choice is yours now, it's obvious your leaders would rather slam the messengers, do you want FGM across all states, you want no-go zones in your cities, you want to see your car being burnt, you want to see sharia law in certain places, sharia banking, your women covering up, the odd honor killing here and there to wake up. Will you be the wise one or the fool? Image thanks to Yahoo Images.

The fact that there is no new money proves that the Victorian Premier held out on a vital national water agreement for 14 months for naked political purposes. Mr Rudd and the Victorian premier have been complicit in ensuring that there was no new water agreement until now.

The Victorian State ALP should be punished for this. It won’t be, of course.Read the whole infuriating article. The fact is that the ALP is not fit to hold office – not anywhere. And that is because they are clearly our (the community’s) enemies when their party political interest conflicts with ours. The press keeps touting Rudd as having not put a step wrong. Frankly, I’m yet to see him put one right. The corruption, lying and spin that’s been flying from Canberra and its largely tame press is completely out of control.

By AR - Until just recently any acknowledgement by the US President of the Australian Prime Minister would bring with it calls of lapdog, lickspittle, sheriff's deputy, and street parades featuring two papier mache dogs humping. But that's all changed now. Bush Backs Rudd, trumpets the Sydney Morning Herald.

Everything between the two leaders is pallsy-wallsy. Bush thinks Rudd deserves a Man Of Steel moniker, and Rudd made Bush an honorary Queenslander. But Rudd almost went too far when he, "when he mentioned the sunshine state was bigger than the President's beloved home of Texas." Ho ho ho.

The press conference was described as "jovial". Yeah, more like a joke. When Rudd says this, "We need to sign up a common script both military and civil on how we actually prosecute and succeed in this conflict. Once (we do that) ... we then say to all Afghanistan partners let's all step up to the plate to make this work across the country of Afghanistan"... and Bush in turn describes Rudd as, "a straight-shooter," you can be sure someone is having a laugh.

ALL THREE surviving species of African zebras could lose their stripes in as little as 50-70 years as global warming threatens their habitat and way of life, Greenpeace UK reveals. Zebras, horses and wild asses are all equids: long-lived animals that move quickly for their large size. Their teeth have evolved to crop and grind grass. Zebras have horse-like bodies, similar to stocky ponies. The most noticeable difference between zebras and horses -- for now -- is the zebras' distinctive striped coats, making them one of the most instantly-recognizable of Africa's ruminants, and a particular favourite with children.

The most numerous and widespread species in East Africa is the common or Burchell's zebra. Grevy's zebra, chiefly found in northern Kenya, was named for Jules Grevy, a president of France in the 1880s who received one from Ethiopia as a gift. The mountain zebra, Equus zebra, is, found in southern and southwestern Africa.

The zebra's coat can vary greatly in pattern, number and width of stripes. The stripes' disruptive coloration breaks up the outline of the body. At twilight, when their predators are most active, zebras appear indistinct.

Zebras' shiny coats dissipate over 70% of incoming heat. In one of the strange coincidences of science, the albedo or reflectance of a typical zebra's coat -- at around 31% - is identical to that of the entire planet Earth as seen from space. Sir John Houghton, the first chair of the IPCC's science working group, says albedo is a scientific measure of the percentage of radiant energy incident upon a surface that is reflected off that surface rather than transmitted through it or absorbed and emitted by it.

But this uncanny coincidence will not last long. As the Earth warms and polar or glacial ice melts, the planetary albedo is set to fall, causing a temperature feedback that will amplify global warming. Zebras, however, according to Dr. Ieuan ap Rhyl of the African Union's new International Zoological Survey Division, are responding to increasingly warmer ambient temperatures by a progressive reduction in the breadth of the black stripes on their coats. In each new generation, the mean thickness of each stripe is reduced by up to 6%, so that more of the zebra's coat will be able to reflect the sun's rays, helping to keep the zebra cool. In 50-70 years, says Dr. Ap Rhyl, the zebras' coats will appear very similar to grey horses' coats. The stripes will be gone.

Al Gore spoke up for the zebras on CBS 60 Minutes yesterday: "This is another wake-up call for the planet. How much more hard evidence do our leaders need before they act to protect the Earth's most precious creatures from the selfishness and greed of humankind? Political will, unlike zebra stripes, is a renewable resource."

Greenpeace stands for positive change through action. We defend the natural world and promote peace. We investigate, expose and confront environmental abuse by governments and corporations throughout the world. We champion environmentally responsible and socially just solutions, including scientific innovation. Our goal is to ensure the ability of the earth to nurture life in all its diversity. We have been working with the Zoological Survey of the African Union on this and other projects to save the continent's threatened wildlife.

Yes. It's a spoof -- from the inimitable Christopher Monckton. It came out a couple of days ago and fooled even some knowledgeable people -- showing how hard it is to send up people as absurd as the Warmists are. They have made so many outlandish claims in the past that it is hard to think of something more absurd that what they have already said.

By AR - Vivienne Westwood used her return to catwalk fashion after a nine year absence to parade her line of statement undies. The lingerie section is run by her son Mark Corre and he, together with human rights lawyer (need you ask?) Clive Stafford Smith, designed some protest knickers when Guantanamo Bay guards accused a terror support group... sorry, detainee support group of smuggling in clean undies to the inmates.

Says Corre, "I don't really mind who buys them, or if we sell any at all. As a company we've often taken an interest in the political theatre. Whoever said you can't mix business with politics is obviously an idiot, as the two are inextricably linked."

He's quick to accuse people of being idiots, certainly quicker than he is to accuse people caught fighting for Al Qaeda of being terrorists.

His market needn't be restricted to lefties. If he wants to sell more undies, I suggest he stick a portrait of the Gitmo inmates right over the arse region and on the inside. I got a few political statements of my own I could make.

AUSTRALIA has added its voice to the international chorus of outrage over an anti-Islam film posted on the internet by a right wing Dutch politician.Foreign Minister Stephen Smith today said Geert Wilders' film Fitna equated Islam with acts of terror and violence and was "highly offensive".

SMH - A SURVEY of 1000 Australians found more than half would support a levy on alcohol sales to fund alcohol treatment and prevention services. Australian National Council on Drugs executive officer Gino Vumbaca said a small levy of five or 10cents per drink would go a long way towards financing education campaigns and treatment services.

It would be nice if only those who binge drink and abuse alcohol are targeted by charging them for the costs of their habit, but we all know that ain't gonna to happen, we're not big on personal responsibility here in the West. I know some folks won't like this because those of us who drink in moderation are also caught up in this but the way I see it, it's better than just screwing over the taxpayer, drinkers and non-drinkers alike.

The West - Fearing a repeat of violent clashes that followed the publication in 2005 of cartoons depicting the Prophet Mohammed in Danish newspapers, the Dutch government has distanced itself from Wilders’ film, albeit Islamic leaders there have called for calm. UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon yesterday joined Muslim nations in expressing outrage over the film. UN chief Ban called Geert Wilders’ film offensive while Iran and Bangladesh warned it could have grave consequences and Pakistan protested to the Dutch ambassador.

Would they be denouncing, slithering and changing their underwear if some movie was made that's deemed offensive to Christianity? The truth hurts eh, those sniveling sons of sniveling hyenas, what Wilders' showed was the truth, he didn't say that all Muslims are angling to slit throats and fly planes into buildings, but there are a significant minority who do and what's worse, a sizable majority who take anything said about them as offensive and we should rather just shut the hell up or else. There was nothing offensive about the film, he only showed the truth and he showed where the perpetrators get their ideas from and he called for reform in Islam.

That's it, for that they sold him out, they hung him out to dry, screw freedom of speech, no such thing in the west anymore, that's only for those who agree with the bastard cowards. Go out and get what weapons you're allowed to folks, the day will come when you'll have to fight for the rights we hear about so often, you will have to earn them or do without. Your leaders and elites have sold you out, they have no balls and they only have contempt for you. Wilders' said, this is the last warning, we see our leaders and elites are either too stupid or cowardly to heed the warnings, they have gone quietly into the night, the question is, are you the same and will you follow them?

Verily, our religion will stay the same till the Day of Judgment. We are happy that there are people like you to expose themselves to the wrath of Allah. We are also happy because it makes us comfortable knowing that there are true enemies of Islaam as Allah has mentioned in the Qur’aan.

We are not interested in condemning this or condemning that, but we are interested in letting you know that Islaam will dominate all of Europe, including your hometown, and the Jizyah will be established upon your Country, leaving all of the disbelievers in humiliation until they come to Islaam. Let us remind that there are thousands of Muslims living near you; so always expect the unexpected.

Apparently - if the response to Geert’s film is anything to go by - if you and I don’t like the idea of this (and say so), we’re racist, bigoted, and the promulgators of hate speech, and that’s just coming from our own cuddly Leftists.

Carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is the product of oceanic respiration due to the well-known but under-appreciated solubility pump. Carbon dioxide rises out of warm ocean waters where it is added to the atmosphere. There it is mixed with residual and accidental CO2, and circulated, to be absorbed into the sink of the cold ocean waters. Next the thermohaline circulation carries the CO2?rich sea water deep into the ocean. A millennium later it appears at the surface in warm waters, saturated by lower pressure and higher temperature, to be exhausted back into the atmosphere.

Throughout the past 420 millennia, comprising four interglacial periods, the Vostok record of atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration is imprinted with, and fully characterized by, the physics of the solubility of CO2 in water, along with the lag in the deep ocean circulation. Notwithstanding that carbon dioxide is a greenhouse gas, atmospheric carbon dioxide has neither caused nor amplified global temperature increases. Increased carbon dioxide has been an effect of global warming, not a cause. Technically, carbon dioxide is a lagging proxy for ocean temperatures. When global temperature, and along with it, ocean temperature rises, the physics of solubility causes atmospheric CO2 to increase. If increases in carbon dioxide, or any other greenhouse gas, could have in turn raised global temperatures, the positive feedback would have been catastrophic. While the conditions for such a catastrophe were present in the Vostok record from natural causes, the runaway event did not occur. Carbon dioxide does not accumulate in the atmosphere.

LiveLeak Removes 'Fitna' After Death Threats" Following threats to our staff of a very serious nature, and some ill informed reports from certain corners of the British media that could directly lead to the harm of some of our staff, Liveleak.com has been left with no other choice but to remove Fitna from our servers.

This is a sad day for freedom of speech on the net but we have to place the safety and well being of our staff above all else. We would like to thank the thousands of people, from all backgrounds and religions, who gave us their support. They realised LiveLeak.com is a vehicle for many opinions and not just for the support of one.

Perhaps there is still hope that this situation may produce a discussion that could benefit and educate all of us as to how we can accept one anothers culture.

We stood for what we believe in, the ability to be heard, but in the end the price was too high."UPDATE at 3/28/08 3:23:35 pm:

Here’s how to download a copy of the high-quality stereo version from YouTube: right-click the following link, choose ‘Save Link As...’, and enter ‘Fitna.mp4’ as the filename:

Fitna.mp4 (right-click, Save As...)LGFThere ya go, folks--what you can see, hear and read now depends on whether a pack of goat-humping primitives find it acceptable.R.I.P. free speech. We're now finding out just how spineless the West has become. All the talk about civil war, about how great our armies are, how a few good men and women will stand up to this tide of filth is just that--talk.We don't have the balls for this fight.

From the April 7 2008 Edition of National Review Online, The Week. Click here to subscribe folks, it's like $2 a month, money well spent I say.

Al-Qaeda trains its terrorists to resist known interrogation tactics, so the United States has a national-security interest in keeping such tactics secret. Congressional Democrats, however, tried to make the country’s techniques quite literally an open book: They wanted to restrict interrogators to the practices approved in the Army Field Manual, a publicly available document. Fortunately, President Bush vetoed the bill. Democrats are pretending that he acted out of enthusiasm for waterboarding. But that is not the issue: While waterboarding is rough stuff, the United States has not used it in five years, and even then employed the technique on a grand total of three terrorists. Their colleagues should not know what to expect from our interrogators, even if we know all too well what to expect from the Democrats.

President Bush and our intelligence agencies want to go after terrorists abroad. The Democrats and their trial-lawyer partners seem as interested in going after American businesses that have cooperated in good faith with anti-terrorism operations. That’s the short version of Nancy Pelosi’s decision to stick the stiletto into a bipartisan bill — one supported by two-thirds of Senate Democrats — that would have restored our intelligence agencies’ ability to monitor communications among foreign terrorism suspects operating outside of the United States. The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act was intended to protect Americans at home from being spied on by the government without a warrant. But an unnamed judge for a secret court issued an unpublished opinion extending FISA protections to Iraq, Afghanistan, Iran, China — the whole planet. Republicans and responsible Democrats in Congress cooperated to reclaim our intelligence capabilities, but the bill they passed to do so, the Protect America Act, expired in February. Democrats in the House have refused to renew it unless congressional Republicans and the president agree to expose U.S. communications companies to billions of dollars in lawsuits for having cooperated with U.S. intelligence agencies in the wake of 9/11. As of this writing, a telephone call between Osama bin Laden and Moqtada al-Sadr, each in his Middle East hideout, enjoys the same protection as a call between a husband and wife in Topeka. That’s national defense, Pelosi-style.

Events this year have exposed, once and for all, in a way that cannot be denied, elided, or spun, Democratic liberals as the party of abject incompetence and institutionalized corruption.

Eliot Spitzer worked his way to the governorship of New York State as the living embodiment of liberal higher morality, crusading against a series of dubious financial and corporate villains. His downfall as the result of a prostitution scheme too moronic for fiction might be taken as evidence of personal failings and no more were it not for the fact that his replacement, David A. Paterson, confessed to similar activities as the first official act of his administration. (If not even more egregious -- no one, after all, has accused Spitzer of trading jobs for sexual favors).

We need only add James McGreevey, ousted in 2004 from New Jersey's governorship for homosexual escapades with an aide (apppointed to a homeland security job with the state for which he had no qualifications), to conclude that liberalism has subsided to a level of corruption of European dimensions.

It's often overlooked -- thanks in large part to the Clinton "legacy" -- that such misbehavior is almost always accompanied by corruption in other spheres. Insistence by Clinton's defenders that his various lady troubles were "personal matters" succeeded in obscuring the moral connection between Big Bill's follies and the endless bribes, kickbacks, suicides, illegal mass firings, and vanishing files that made the "most ethical administration in history" so entertaining to watch.

So it needs restating as a simple truth that a man who cannot control his sexual impulses is unlikely to succeed in more complex matters. In little over a year, Spitzer threw away the goodwill engendered by his landslide victory through a series of petty conspiracies and dirty tricks, bringing New York state government to a standstill in the process. While McGreevey was a better governor than he's ever likely to get credit for (he solved the longstanding auto-insurance "crisis" that made New Jersey a laughingstock for half a dozen previous administrations), his penchant for putting his muscle boys on the state payroll undercuts any other claims for his record. The same can be said for Paterson. Though, being both blind and black, he may likely survive, revelations concerning his practice of awarding jobs and positions don't bode well for the future.

These men are clearly representative of the post-Clinton Democratic Party. They set out to follow in Bill's footsteps, have ended up much the same as he did, and have dragged their party and political doctrine along with them. (At this point somebody will bring up the names Foley and Craig. But neither stood anywhere near the center of American conservatism in the way that the Northeastern governors do with liberalism as a matter of course. Foley and Craig were rotten apples. With the Democrats, it's the whole barrel.)

In turning to the presidential campaign, we need do no more than mention Madame Hillary. The Ma Barker of Little Rock is in a class by herself when it comes to political iniquity (not to mention dodging snipers). The chief puzzle concerning Hillary is how, being so blatantly what she is, she succeeds in holding onto any support whatsoever. There's a process in quantum mechanics called "renormalization", in which certain quantities with values of infinity are arbitrarily dropped back to a more manageable "zero" for the sake of solving the equation. This encapsulates Hillary's political career: truly mindboggling levels of corruption and ineptitude have been continually renormalized by fellow politicians and the media to enable her to survive. These people made a particular type of bargain when they bent the rules for Hillary. Now the ground is opening up under their feet. It has been a pleasure to watch.

Barack Obama was supposed to be another matter. Obama has ascended on a cloud of pure moral superiority and nothing else. That has now evaporated, thanks to impolitic comments from his wife and the news that he has for two decades belonged to what amounts to a racist cult. Obama has nothing else to offer in the way of experience or achievements. Beyond his current difficulties, there lie his continuing and as yet unexplained entanglement with Tony Rezko (He barely knew the man, he insists. All he did was show Rezko his new house before closing. I always clear major purchases with people I scarcely know, don't you?), along with pending revelations concerning his relationship with Bill Ayers, a former terrorist who began his career as one of the driving forces of the Weather Underground.

Obama's response, his "Kennedyesque" speech on race, was in fact purely Clintonian in that it attempted to transform his failings into virtues while placing the blame on the country as a whole. (Not to mention his innocent typical white grandmother.) In less than two weeks, Obama has succeeded in lowering himself to the same level as Madame Hillary. Quite an achievement. (As for Obama's claims to be a necessary "racial reconciliator", this reconciliation has in fact been going on since the end of segregation, quite successfully too. As is often the case with liberals, Obama is offering a solution to a problem that is solving itself.)

To this gallery we can add Jennifer Granholm, who assured that Michigan's current slide was as drastic and damaging as possible, Ed Rendell, Hillary's consigliere for Pennsylvania, John Murtha, Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid and Kwame Kilpatrick, charged with perjury, obstruction of justice, and malfeasance in office. That's the Democratic Party, the bastion of American liberalism, as it stands. A party whose entire leadership cadre, including presidential candidates, state governors, and Congressional leaders, are corrupt or incompetent or both, a party more suitable to ruling a Balkan or Central African peapatch than the world's reigning superpower.

By AR - Well, ok it's a long way from being a major anything, but I was thrilled to read in my local free-newspaper, The Weekly Times, an editorial blasting Earth Hour for the farce it is.

"Children and their big kid parents are being tricked into taking part in the Earth Hour farce again this Saturday night."

It's a bit unusual for a local paper to take such an approach and risk offending readers (and losing advertisers). Normally local papers are anodyne in their opinions playing it safe and PC. I commend the editor for his fearless stance in combating the Earth Hour hoax.

“It never ceases to amaze me how critics of any war the West has waged on blood soaked tyrants. . .seem to imply that there is somehow something immoral about the undertaking. Had Saddam Hussein been in power today, the Iraqi death toll would probably have stood at 2 million.

A successful Western intervention in 1918 against the Bolshevik coup d'état in Russia would have saved 20 million lives, a similar move against Mao Tse Tung in China in 1946 approximately 60 million.

We can question the political or strategic wisdom of the Iraq war, but never its morality.”

An email from Kirtland C. Griffin [kirtgriffin@sbcglobal.net] of Guilford, CT

In an article in the Economist, Feb 21st 2008, it talks about the acidification of the oceans caused by anthropogenic CO2. It says that if something doesn't change, portions of the world's oceans could no longer support certain forms of aquatic life. Specifically at risk are sponges, corals and brachiopods. The concern relates in part to the huge volcanic eruptions at the end of the Permian Period 252 million years ago. They say that CO2 spewed from the volcanos caused the world's oceans to become more acidic, or probably more correctly, less alkaline.

The origin of the concern is a mathematical model. Where have we heard that before? They say that it is not only the reduction in alkalinity that is a concern but that, in conjunction with increasing ocean temperature, is more detrimental than either alone. Of course, the claim is made that this could lead to a domino effect and who knows what could happen if we continue to emit green house gas pollution?

What is important is not so much what the article says but rather how I became aware of it as well as what it does not say. An associate of mine had shown me a news release by a prominent US University. Not surprisingly, it espoused the UN IPCC line of alarmist AGW catastrophes. Knowing how I felt about the subject he asked what I thought of it because he was going there over the coming weekend and would be able to ask those responsible for the news release to comment on my input. I gave him what I though was a good assortment of scientific and political arguments and off he went as I eagerly awaited the outcome. Well, since he was "one of them" working with the department on a project, they actually told him they didn't buy the global warming thing either. That was a story for the general public to force them to do the right thing for the wrong reason. The world has to change their lifestyle for its own good. One can only imagine my surprise to hear that what many had thought, was really true.

This would have been a significant enough revelation to make this story interesting to any skeptic, but there was more to come. After relating the story to me, this individual went back a second time. This time they presented him with the article from the Economist and asked for further comment thinking that this time he had me. Now I am no ocean scientist, nor am I a chemist, but something smelled. After a little looking I found my information on the CO2, carbonic acid, calcite system.

The oceans are a vast reservoir of Carbon in various forms and there is a well regulated compensation system that covers a wide range of CO2 concentrations and temperature variation that has worked over billions of years. The other thing was that volcanos spew out CO2 but also SO2 as the Number 2 gas. Sorry, no pun intended. SO2 dissolved in water yields sulfurous acid, so I am told by Oliver Manuel, which is a much stronger acid than carbonic acid. So the effects associated with volcanic eruptions are unrelated to the current situation and was more severe. But that has never bothered the DAGW proponents. When I presented my rebuttal, the response was that this has nothing to do with the AGW agenda. This is different. IT CLEARLY IS NOT!

As sure as I am sitting here writing this, acidification is the next hoax to be perpetrated on the world to rein in our fossil fuel appetite. As the average global temperature continues to decline, the socialist opportunists will have to find another way to control the world and collect their carbon taxes to support their agenda and profit motives. Has anyone ever wondered that the primary architect of the Kyoto Protocol is a buddy of Al Gore and sells carbon credits?

The recent report of ocean temperatures cooling will not help their cause but even the National Jet Propulsion Laboratory suspects there might be a problem with the measurements. Apparently, the results did not conform to their preconceived notion of the outcome. The ocean temperature data may be a revelation as to the condition of our surface measurement system which several have demonstrated has a warming bias from the location of the stations to the corrections for the urban heat island effect.

The President of the Czech Republic, Dr Maclav Klaus, had it right when he said "A week ago, I gave a speech at an official gathering at the Prague Castle commemorating the 60th anniversary of the 1948 communist putsch in the former Czechoslovakia. One of the arguments of my speech there, quoted in all the leading newspapers in the country the next morning, went as follows: "Future dangers will not come from the same source. The ideology will be different. Its essence will, nevertheless, be identical - the attractive, pathetic, at first sight noble idea that transcends the individual in the name of the common good, and the enormous self-confidence of its proponents about their right to sacrifice man and his freedom in order to make this idea reality." What I had in mind was, of course, environmentalism especially in its currently strongest version, climate alarmism....It has never been about the environment."

Thanks to LA Times - Parents who lack teaching credentials cannot educate their children at home, according to a state appellate court ruling that is sending waves of fear through California's home schooling families. Advocates for the families vowed to appeal the decision to the state Supreme Court. Enforcement until then appears unlikely, but if the ruling stands, home-schooling supporters say California will have the most regressive law in the nation.

We all know the elites and lefties would love to crack down on such parents, so they can get their hands on your children and indoctrinate them with their PC crap. Well folks we may have found a small chink in their armor, a weakness that usually stops lefties in their tracks like a head-on with a semi.

Thanks to IHT - Across the United States, Muslims who find that a public school education clashes with their religious or cultural traditions have turned to home schooling. That choice is intended partly as a way to build a solid Muslim identity away from the prejudices that their children, boys and girls alike, can face in schoolyards. But in some cases, as in Bibi's, the intent is also to isolate their adolescent and teenage daughters from the corrupting influences that they see in much of American life.

So remember this folks, we all know some discrimination is alright for lefties so they'll have no problem just targeting Christian families. But they can be shamed into doing the right thing if enough of us can muster the will and noise. Oh and about those corrupting influences, I think we all know they mean the liberal lifestyle not the "American" life, but you can hardly expect liberal media to shaft themselves can you.

LiveNews - A Sydney judge has quashed a conviction against broadcaster Alan Jones for wrongly naming a juvenile involved in a court case. In February Alan Jones was convicted of wrongly naming a juvenile giving evidence in a trial. He had a criminal conviction recorded and a fine. But today Justice Finnane found that Mr Jones acted honestly in reporting the name with a belief that what he was doing was lawful.

"Not surprisingly the author is N. American, a continent grown incontinent after 9/11 and where most people's knowledge of Europe fits snugly on the back of a very small stamp.""The average American citizen doesn't care about the world's problems, they only care about what brand of shoes they wear...sad but true!"-- Recent comment from a British website

Really? I, for one, have grown sick and tired of these false and deceptive Old World arguments eagerly put forth against our great country, sick of the dishonest and transparent ruse of comparing the lowest forms of our American culture to the highest forms of some other culture in order to make the point that America is degrading the native cultures of the world. Too many pictures of those tacky MacDonald's Golden Arches in Cairo or those blaring Coke signs in Rome. We didn't exactly force this on you, you know? We didn't twist your delicate arms until you cried Uncle. If you didn't want this materialistic glitter, it wouldn't be there. Simple as that. You despise our degenerate culture yet you adore our fantasy Disneylands.

But, what about all those other things? What about all those tremendous advances in medicine, science, technology, and the arts? What of our long honorable history of unparalleled generosity? What of all those war torn countries -- many of whom were our bitterest enemies -- who, through our open-hearted generosity were saved from utter collapse and ruin? What of our fashionably despised and dishonored military who, if they had not taken up their honorable duty in Britain and in Europe and tolerated the condescending insults from the very people they were protecting, who would have surely fallen under the boot of brutal Fascist or Communist tyrannies long ago and more than once?

Yet of course you despise us for this, you despise the strength that protects you. Why then not forswear our help and turn to that ever-more-hopelessly conflicted and useless UN for your protection? Or put your trust in that comically befuddled military power of the EU? The answer of course is simple. You need us. You need our protection and you despise us for that fact.

You love our inane glitzy Hollywood culture and of course you despise us for that, too. You look down your pinched noses at our pedestrian morays, but you would sell your grandmother for a shot on American Idol. Your pervasive multicultural absurdities have led you to eagerly embrace the blatant lie of Muslim moral superiority -- despite all of the buckets of bloody evidence to the contrary. You have meekly acquiesced to a degenerate belief system that attempts to equate the embarrassment of a Britney Spears to the beheading of a Daniel Pearl. And you are proud of your cowardice and call it a shining example of tolerance and open-mindedness. You have refined yourself out of reality, and the delicate and precious world that have constructed in its place will shatter about you like glass at the very first assault.

Simply put, you are dishonoring the honorable heritage of your brave grandparents, you are losing your will to fight back and thereby losing your precious and honorable society, yet you have the pomposity to attempt to condescend to our strong and brave America, whose soldiers are fighting and dying all over this violent world for other people's freedoms. You insult us and you degrade us. And you rest assured in the comfortable conviction that you are somehow inherently intellectually and morally superior to us.

Well, this particular Yank, who has spent his whole adult life studying, is getting a little fed up with taking these innumerable snide remarks from a little people who haven't shown the backbone or courage to save their own wonderful country from this growing onslaught of brutal barbarians. To appease your oppressors and save your precious hides, you have turned your backs on your own heroic sons, like the brave Lionheart, and criminalized his honesty and driven him from his home. You have embraced the cowardice of Chamberlain as your role model, and attempted to disguise your weaknesses by pretending that they are some higher form of civilized behavior called Multiculturalism.

We, then, the rude Yanks, are the new barbarians now. Yet, how is it then that somehow we have managed to accumulate more symphony orchestras than any other two European countries combined? more successful operas, more successful ballets, more internationally recognized artists and authors than any other country in this hemisphere? And why is it that this crass, unlettered public of ours, who is only interested in what brand of shoes they wear, works harder and puts in more hours and takes less vacations than any of those feeble and declining unionized socialistic European workers wallowing in their increasingly failing and stagnant economies could ever conceive of?

Through our good-hearted but misguided generosity we have become a paradigm of East Berlin in reverse -- we are being forced to build walls to keep out the daily onslaught of frantic and desperate invaders who besiege our degenerate nation daily, literally dying and selling their very bodies to just get one foot into our detestable imperialistic country -- to grab hold of that slim chance that perhaps today, if they're lucky, and if they don't get raped or robbed or sold off into prostitution rings, they just might make it past the border control and find a place here to live and perhaps find a little hope and happiness. These desperate people put the lie to all of those self-serving intellectual bullsh*t arguments about the declining moral promise of America or the unjust system of our government daily with their own blood.

For at least two generations now we Americans have been taking it on the chin from ignorant, self-righteous student activists and disillusioned psuedo-intellectuals brought up on that pervasive academic witches brew of those Marxist-driven, Moscow coordinated sanctimonious and cynically manipulated student protest movements of the 60s. We -- and you -- are now living with the bitter fruits of their destructive labors. Cynicism and disillusionment have become a refined art form throughout Old Europe and the UK, the motley uniform of the latest anti-capitalist, anti-American, antiwar avant-garde. To be wise is to be cynical, distrustful, and anti-American -- only trailer park bumpkins are unthinkingly patriotic, only the uninformed, unwashed, beer-drinking chain-smokers are to be seen saluting the American flag without embarrassment.

Your house is on fire, yet somehow you manage to find the time to come over here and criticize our garden.Roger Gardner

John McCain is scheduled to deliver a major foreign policy speech Wednesday in Los Angeles, one with a heavy Iraq focus, but chances are Democrats won't be listening. They've already distilled his views into an easy to remember formulation: 100 years of war. It is a reference to an offhand remark made by McCain in January about the possible duration of the U.S. presence in Iraq, a comment that Democrats now portray as the equivalent of the McCain Doctrine.... On a recent conference call with reporters, Howard Wolfson, Clinton's bulldog operative, mentioned four times in two minutes that John McCain "wants to be in Iraq for 100 years." ....

McCain never actually went so far as to call for a century-long occupation. Rather, in response to a New Hampshire town hall questioner who asked about President Bush's statement that U.S. troops could be in Iraq for 50 years, McCain interrupted and said, "Make it 100." "We've been in South Korea . . . we've been in Japan for 60 years," he continued. "We've been in South Korea for 50 years or so. That would be fine with me. As long as Americans are not being injured or harmed or wounded or killed, that's fine with me. I hope that would be fine with you, if we maintain a presence in a very volatile part of the world where al-Qaeda is training, recruiting and equipping and motivating people every single day."

Hmmmm... I've got to give the NYT some praise for reprinting in full a recent speech by McCain. Other outlets just picked out the bits they felt able to criticize. I am on the mailing list for the McCain campaign so I was able to check that the NYT DID reprint the speech in full. It is a most interesting speech for the way it seriously attempts to explain what is going on -- instead of the series of cheap shots and vague generalizations that the Democrats usually put out. It once again makes clear that an interest in the facts is one of the major things that marks out conservatives as different from the Left. McCain is treating the voters as intelligent. Let's hope that works.

By AR - The Australian Democrats, once the third force in Australian politics but now whittled down to... well, nothing after the next senate term expires, have some advice for the ADF in finding quality recruits. In a recruiting crisis brought about by a booming economy, (bloody Howard!) the ADF needs to look further afield for candidates. According to Natasha Stott Despoja (the Dems longest serving pol), the ADF's new recruits should be made up of women:

"Of the 3,500 personnel currently deployed overseas, only 164 are women," and Pacific Islanders: "This makes even more sense when you consider the Rudd government's intention to focus the deployment of our military personnel on the Asia-Pacific region."Even more sense??? Who said it made any sense?

But true to Democrat principles which has seen the party obliterated in recent elections she reveals why recruiting Pacific Islanders is A Good Idea - those recruits would learn skills and earn money which would support their communities. Some sort of work for the dole scheme... with guns.

It looks like Natasha's ideas are spreading. Employment in the Australian agricultural industry is also at crisis levels.

Their solution? "... an easing of immigration laws to allow Pacific islanders to come to Australia on a seasonal basis to pick fruit and vegetables. We are continuing to promote the islander seasonal worker concept."

Thanks to News.com.au - HE'S lost, he's exhausted and he needs help to get home. This cuddly golden retriever was found near the border town of Goondiwindi, about 320km southwest of Brisbane, on Easter Monday. The pooch was exhausted and his pads were worn through and full of prickles. "We were driving along and I said, like, 'what's that on the road?'," Ms Martin said. "We just had to pick him up. Semi-trailers were flying by and just missing him. "My partner got him to the side of the road and he just dropped down, he was so exhausted. "He was wagging his tail." "He's estimated to be between eight and 11 years old and has been well looked after," Mr Beatty said. "He looks like he never knocks back a feed."

Spread the word folks, if you know someone who knows someone who has lost this fellow, they have a link at the source page.

“You often hear it said, of some political or other opportunist, that he would sell his own grandmother if it would suit his interests. But you seldom, if ever, see this notorious transaction actually being performed, which is why I am slightly surprised that Obama got away with it so easily. (Yet why do I say I am surprised? He still gets away with absolutely everything.)”

That's the headline folks [click thumbnail below], a little baby, just barely walking, stumbling around really, when this mean, nasty knife came along, jumped into his hands and as he was tripping it accidentally slid into his father, repeatedly. The poor, poor little boy, what a tragedy, hiss-boo at the knife. At this point I think they are expecting you all to break into hysterical wailing, sobbing and angrily demanding that the nanny state bloody 'do something', ban those nasty, vicious knives. But wait, they've already been banned, can't sell them to folks under 18, can't carry them and this might come as a shock, but stabbing someone is also against the law. Then dammit we need more laws, get the PM on the phone, more laws, more laws, ban those vicious, nasty little bastards, do something!

SMH - HE LISTENED to heavy metal and played drums and violent video games, but it was a list naming those who had teased or wronged him that caught the attention of students at his Catholic private school. This was the 16-year-old in north-western Sydney who was charged yesterday with the stabbing murder of his father, 57, and the attempted stabbing murder of his mother, 50. Another resident said the parents were lovely but the boy was "a little strange".

Maybe he is just evil, but that's just too simple I guess, so we'll need to complicate everything, bring the shrinks, social workers, ban video games, TV and all that, coddle the killer, it can't just be him, society, capitalism, America, Christianity, whitey perhaps. If found guilty, since he is under 18, I'm thinking 5-10 years in juvenile detention at the most, unless he pleads manslaughter and the knife is actually blamed, then maybe two years and he will never be named, new identity, location, home etc, screw community safety. They're always the last to know in everything, they are the masters you know and are deserving of the most contempt and loathing, go figure.

Hans Blix Slams Iraq War - HANS Blix, the former chief UN weapons inspector, slammed the Iraq war as a "tragedy" and blamed it on leaders ignoring the facts.

Really? Which facts? Which leaders?

Writing in The Guardian on the fifth anniversary of the US-led invasion of Iraq, Blix, who clashed with Washington in the run-up to the Iraq war, described the war as "a tragedy - for Iraq, for the US, for the UN, for truth and human dignity".

I happen to agree with all of that - but not in the sense that Blix intends it.

In the sub-headline to the comment piece, Mr Blix, who headed the UN Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission, wrote that responsibility for the war "must lie with those who ignored the facts five years ago".

Once again, I agree. Once again, though, we need to clarify. Which facts, Mister Blix?

At the time of the Iraq war, Mr Blix accused the US and Britain of exaggerating the threat from Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein's alleged "weapons of mass destruction" - traces of which have never been found.

Apart from the fact that every nation was operating under the same cloud of misinformation, the statement - 'traces of which have never been found' - is an outright lie, actually. It should come as no surprise whatsoever, though, especially when there has been some suggestion that Blix was deliberately downplaying his team’s findings at the time. This, however, is moot. These are not the only facts we were considering at the time, and nor should they have been.

In his comment piece, he said the war was a "setback in the world's efforts to develop legal restraints on the use of armed force between states". . .

Legal restraints? What dreamboat puff ball of planet is this idiot (and others like him) living on? What law carries any authority whatsoever without an accompanying threat of sanction, and the very real prospect of that sanction being applied?

Mr Blix wrote that had coalition troops not deposed Saddam, "he would, in all likelihood, have become another Gadhafi or Castro; an oppressor of his own people but no longer a threat to the world".

Oh well, that would have been much nicer, wouldn’t it, Hans? Saddam could have quietly kept right on shovelling people into mass graves and we’d have been none the wiser. Win-win, I guess. Of course, there's one tiny problem with Hans and his convenient parallel: as far as I’m aware, neither Libya nor Cuba have indulged in this, or this, or this. . .

The reality is, these people bleat about the ‘Iraqi tragedy’ now – while choosing to completely ignore the Iraqi tragedy as it was. This is the position of a moral pygmy. An effete, who would rather avert his or her eyes than acknowledge the appalling truth and have to act, thank you very much. But the money quote’s coming up, folks, and one of the very few on the anti-side coming even close to admitting that indeed it is our failure in Iraq that they’re really after, and precisely why:

He said that one positive sign to emerge from the conflict was that "it may be that the spectacular failure of ensuring disarmament by force, and of introducing democracy by occupation, will work in favour of a greater use of diplomacy and 'soft power'".

‘One positive’ – ‘spectacular failure’. The egregious BS that are the words ‘spectacular failure’ aside – ‘diplomacy’ and ‘soft power’ worked so well in the decade leading up to Iraq’s invasion, did they? Well - I guess it depends on what you mean by ‘well’. A lot of people did extremely well out of the ‘diplomacy’ and ‘soft power’ efforts with Iraq. Very well indeed. . .

Blix couldn’t have put it more clearly - our loss is their ‘gain’. Regardless to say, I think Blix is an idiot (the nicest take possible). Without threat of sanction, there is no authority, there is no hope of legal restraint – end of story. Ten years of Saddam snubbing his nose at the UN taught us that much. Or you’d have thought it would, if there weren’t far more agendas at play here than these perfidious little creeps will ever admit.

They did it for the communists and now they're doing it for islam:"How would you like your son taught how to be a ‘good Muslim’? Or your daughter taught that she has no independent soul? BRACE YOURSELF…

STATE schools should be forced to open their doors to Islamic preachers teaching the Koran, the largest classroom union demanded yesterday.The National Union of Teachers’ conference also said existing religious schools – almost all of them Christian – should have to admit pupils from other faiths.The union’s general secretary Steve Sinnott said that allowing Muslim imams to preach in schools would be a way to reunite divided communities.But the proposals prompted immediate outrage. Conservative Party backbencher Mark Pritchard said: “This is just further appeasement for Muslim militants."from The Midnight Sun

How many citizens who were robbed knew that the police didn't even bother to look for the criminals, didn't even set a case in motion, so as not to spoil their record of completed cases - why should they sweat to catch a thief if he would be given only six months, and then be given three months off for good behaviour? And anyway, it wasn't certain the bandits would even be tried when caught.

Finally, sentences were bound to be reduced, and of course for habitual criminals especially. Watch out there now, witness in the courtroom! They will all be back soon, and it'll be a knife in the back for anyone who gave testimony!

Therefore, if you see someone crawling through a window [...] shut your eyes! Walk by! You didn't see anything!

Three guesses as to who wrote that.

Peter Hitchens? No.Melanie Phillips? No.Theodore Dalrymple? No.

It was Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn describing the state of Soviet criminal law under Stalin in The Gulag Archipelago: 1918-1956. It is what happens in a society when they accept the Marxist idea that crime (of the non-political type) is borne out of economic hardship rather than having a cost-benefit and moral implication. When I read that part of his book, I became more and more convinced, not that I needed it, that the West may have won the military conflict, but the Communists won the ideological conflict. Particularly here in the UK.

As time goes by, and more and more records are declassified, it is becoming more and more apparent that Joe McCarthy was mistaken about the amount of Soviet infiltration of American institutions: He underestimated it. There was something like over 400 Soviet agents and fellow travellers in the State Department, alone, where he had estimated 200.

Now, imagine the amount of Soviet infiltration into institutions in a country that was not actively looking for Soviet infiltrators. And what you get is modern-day Britain.

My wife is doing some research for her Fine Arts degree on Abstract Expressionism. Her research is leading her down toward the direction in which madness lays...She has discovered the physical, academic, and institutional links between modern art, the Institute for Social Research (aka the Frankfurt School), Antonio Gramsci, the Ford Foundation, and loads of other links in the Communist/Socialist movements of the 20th Century. She had no idea the full extent of the forces working to undo Western Civilisation, with that end being part of their stated goals.

And it is becoming more and more apparent, the more one looks at what these people and their fellow travellers actually stated what they would do, and what has come about in the West over the last 50 years, that there just might be a link between the collapse of the Church, the state of higher education, the intellectual dishonesty of the mass media, and the intentions of the Communists.

Unfortunately (?), there is no central COMINTERN to control the direction of the growing disorder in the West. And now that the Pandora's Box has been opened, one wonders whether these forces that were unleashed beginning from the 1920s (or even before), will ever be stopped. I do believe we live in "interesting times" as the Chinese curse goes. There is more Solzhenitsyn to come...My copy of The Gulag Archipelago now has several dog-eared pages to indicate more gems like the one above.

The BBC is at it again. And Monkey Tennis explains precisely what’s at stake:

Conservatives, and anyone who believes people should be able to make up their own minds about an issue based on a fair presentation of the facts, are engaged in nothing less than a battle for the truth. We may never be able to win outright, but we can't afford to lose.

He’s absolutely right. And judging from the lie-fest we were assaulted with here in Australia in the lead up to our last Federal election, I believe the press is getting worse.

THE incomes of the nation's poorest households rose more dramatically than those of the richest Australians in the final years of the Howard government, buoyed by rising wages and bulging welfare payments. While lone parents, indigenous Australians and the disabled still struggled, overall the poorest households have enjoyed the largest rise in income over the past six years.

The findings of the first study to track changes to income and wealth in the same group of people cast a new light on one of Kevin Rudd's central themes in Opposition - that in John Howard's "brutopia" the rich were getting richer and the poor were getting poorer. During last year's election campaign, Mr Rudd described working families as the "forgotten people", but the new research appears to paint a contrary picture. Since 2001, earnings for those at the bottom of the ladder rose more sharply than for those near the top - the top 10 per cent suffering a slight fall from 2001 to 2006.

While the rise in overall wealth favoured the top end - primarily due to higher property ownership - increases to lower-end incomes meant the rich hadn't skated away from the poor. "The figures show current income is not a good predictor of future income," said labour economist Mark Wooden, who will detail the findings at the two-day New Agenda for Prosperity conference, presented by the Melbourne Institute and The Australian, opening at Melbourne University on Thursday.

The data comes from the federal Government's Household, Income and Labour Dynamics in Australia survey, a longitudinal study of 14,000 people nationwide, which is managed by the institute. "It shows everyone has done pretty well in Australia since 2001," Professor Wooden, institute deputy director, told The Australian. "The rich have done a little better overall than the poor, and those with property have had a big surge. "But those with property are spread across the income spectrum."

The data, compiled by the institute's Roger Wilkins, shows median incomes - after adjusting for inflation - for those in the lowest 10 per cent of households increased 29 per cent after tax to about $26,000. The top 10 per cent saw their income fall by 2.5 per cent to $138,000. Wealth for the median household has risen rapidly since the turn of the century, from $215,000 to $340,000, fuelled by the property boom and a 51per cent increase in average superannuation balances to $123,000. For the bottom 10 per cent, wealth rose from $114,000 to $175,000. For the top 10 per it rose from $770,000 to $975,000.

"Income changes have tended to favour the poor, with the biggest winners being those in the bottom 10per cent and the biggest losers those in the top 10 per cent," Professor Wooden said. "And if you factor in non-cash benefits provided by the Government, the figures would tilt even more in favour of the poor."

Professor Wooden said a significant contributor to the improved fortunes of the poor had been better employment prospects and relatively strong wages growth. Moves from welfare to work almost invariably mean increased incomes, but even among the employed it has been the low-paid who have fared best. "People don't tend to move from one minimum pay job to another," he said. "They move to better jobs. Also at the lower end, there are automatic pay increments built into the system, whereas atthe top of the scale when people are close to their maximum productivity potential, pay increases are harder to come by except when there's a promotion. "And those lighthouse examples of directors getting massive bonuses or payouts? They are just a tiny fraction of the overall picture."

The pro-poor picture in income growth had policy implications for welfare delivery. "The Government could be handing out dollars to people who will be doing a lot better in the near future," Professor Wooden said. "This approach won't do much to address systemic disadvantage."

Those who remained stalled in the lowest 20 per cent of income and wealth over the six years surveyed were the indigenous, lone parents and the disabled. "It is here where the study could point the way to more targeted welfare delivery," hesaid.

In an essay titled Howard's Brutopia: The Battle of Ideas in Australian Politics published in The Monthly in 2006 shortly before he became Opposition leader, Mr Rudd cites warnings about the "brutopia of unchecked market forces".

Gutless, pathetic cowards. No wonder we're losing the fight for the West."Web site name registrar Network Solutions is blocking access to a siteowned by a controversial Dutch politician known for his confrontational views about Islam and Muslim immigrants. The move by one of the largest companies in the domain registration business is notable, experts say, because it may be the first documented case of Internet pre-censorship by a major U.S.-based Web registrar."

I've been banging this drum forever--to those bloggers who fondly imagine that the internet has given us freedom to express our views, and that freedom will last forever--think again.This is how we'll be silenced. The islamists and the totalitarians in our own countries can silence us whenever they choose to do so, because hosting companies by and large don't give a damn about the views expressed, only about the financial costs of the pressure that can be brought to bear.

I was going to advise our British readers or those who paid tax in Britain at some point in their lives, not to read this article, but then they'd be compelled to read it after that won't they. All I can say is, please keep some blood pressure medication handy before reading this, no seriously. Read the full article at the link below, this is about all I could stomach.

Thanks to Daily Mail [Hat tip KG from Crusader Rabbit] - Known as the "Shameless" family among horrified neighbours, the McFaddens "boast" three generations of adults who are not working. All ten members of the clan share a council house and live off benefits amounting to around £32,000 a year. And very happy they are, too. "The only problem is," she says without a hint of irony, "that we're living in a three-bedroom council house, which is ridiculous. "I'm asking the council for a ten-bedroom home for all of us. We need more space. It's awful sometimes when all the children are squabbling. Still, we do have a big TV with Sky, but we need some relaxation."

Jean Thompson, 66, hasn't worked for over 40 years. She lives in Neath, Swansea, with husband Glyn, 61, a retired plumber. They have three grown-up children, two of whom live on benefits, including son Steven Martin, 39. "I'm certainly not angry that Steven doesn't have a job. He's got children, that's his job. And I don't worry that he's setting a bad example to his children - that's up to him." Steven left school 23 years ago and has worked for only five years in that time. It's 12 years since he last had a job. Steven lives in Swansea with partner Donna, 24, who's never worked, and their daughter Celsea, three. His eldest daughter from a previous partner, 17-year-old Jessica, is also on benefits.

Certainly, Emma Sussock's life is a grim blueprint set out by the generations before her. Her mother Ann, a divorcee, hasn't worked for 30 years, and exists on benefits and daytime television. Meanwhile, her beloved step-grandfather Carl Davies, a former gas fitter, has survived on benefits since a heart attack 20 years ago. Ann, a divorcee, lives in a one-bedroom council flat in West Derby, Liverpool. She says: "When I left school at 16 with no qualifications I did a youth training type scheme for a year, serving up meals at the local YMCA for about £25 a week. Then I went on benefits and haven't come off them since. I didn't enjoy the work. "I wasn't encouraged to work hard by my parents and lots of my friends went straight onto benefits, so I did the same.

Six million Britons are living in homes where no one has a job and "benefits are a way of life", according to a report by MPs. Shock figures also revealed that 20,000 households in Britain are pocketing more than £30,000 a year in state benefits.

That is around 60,000 Australian dollars a year, for doing nothing, just sitting on your ass and watching daytime television all day. I can't even fathom that, you suckers are out there busting your asses to earn the average earnings in Australia, which I think is less than 60 large. And when you're done busting your ass to earn that and you get home, there's the taxman waiting for his share of the pie before you can lay your tired ass down so you can do it all over again the next day. Your tax pounds at work folks, hard at work.

On NASA's Aqua satellite data:"If Marohasy is anywhere near right about the impending collapse of the global warming paradigm, life will suddenly become a whole lot more interesting.

A great many founts of authority, from the Royal Society to the UN, most heads of government along with countless captains of industry, learned professors, commentators and journalists will be profoundly embarrassed. Let us hope it is a prolonged and chastening experience.

With catastrophe off the agenda, for most people the fog of millennial gloom will lift, at least until attention turns to the prospect of the next ice age. Among the better educated, the sceptical cast of mind that is the basis of empiricism will once again be back in fashion. The delusion that by recycling and catching public transport we can help save the planet will quickly come to be seen for the childish nonsense it was all along."

The amount of long-lasting sea ice in the Arctic -- thick enough to survive for as much as a decade -- declined sharply in the past year, even though the region had a cold winter and the thinner one-year ice cover grew substantially, federal officials said yesterday. Using new data from NASA's ICESat satellite, researchers over the past year detected the steepest yearly decline in "perennial" ice on record.

As a result of melting and the southward movement of the thicker ice, the percentage of the Arctic Ocean with this stable ice cover has decreased from more than 50 percent in the mid-1980s to less than 30 percent as of last month. "Because we had a cold winter, the public might think things have gotten better," said Walter Meier of the National Snow and Ice Data Center at the University of Colorado at Boulder. "In fact, the loss of the perennial ice makes clear that they're not getting better at all."

The surprising drop in perennial ice makes the fast-changing region more unstable, because the thinner seasonal ice melts readily in summer. The Arctic lost an unprecedented amount of ice during last summer's unusual warmth, and Meier said conditions are right for a similarly large melt if the temperatures are at all above normal this year. The area of thick Arctic ice lost over the past two decades equals 1 1/2 times the size of Alaska.

While normal weather variation plays a role in yearly ice fluctuations, officials said the dramatic decline in perennial ice -- which can range from 6 feet thick to more than 15 feet thick -- appears to be consistent with the effects of global warming. Officials said the loss of long-lasting ice was less the result of warming of the atmosphere than of a long-term rise in ocean temperatures and the effects of the "Arctic oscillation," a variable wind pattern that can either keep icebergs in the Arctic (when the wind pattern is "negative") or push them south (when it is "positive").

Climate experts believe that both the rising water temperature and increasingly frequent "positive" oscillations are a function of global warming. Josefino Comiso of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, the lead author of a related 2007 study, said Arctic Ocean temperatures appear to be rising quickly because less of the water is covered by ice, which reflects sunlight and keeps water temperatures lower. After last summer's very warm weather, the amount of ice cover shrank dramatically, and the water became warmer.

He said climate experts have concluded that the Arctic oscillation, which is a natural climate phenomenon, is also being modified by global warming. The dynamics are not yet understood, but it appears that higher temperatures in the tropics and elsewhere make it more likely that the oscillation will push icebergs down past Greenland and into the Atlantic.

Arctic sea ice always grows and shrinks, ranging from an average minimum in September of 2.5 million square miles to an average winter maximum in March of 5.9 million square miles. Instruments on NASA's Aqua satellite, as well as Defense Department satellites, showed that the maximum sea ice extent in March increased by 3.9 percent over that of the previous three years because of the winter. Nonetheless, the total ice coverage was still 2.2 percent below the long-term average.

And the very old ice, which remains in the Arctic for at least six years, made up more than 20 percent of the Arctic in the mid- to late 1980s, but by this winter it had decreased to 6 percent. Flying over the Arctic, one might perceive the sea ice cover as broad, Meier said, but that apparent breadth hides the fact that the ice is so thin. "It's a facade, like a Hollywood set," he said. "There's no building behind it."

While the Arctic sea ice is changing fast, the same is not true in Antarctica. Comiso said the amount of ice surrounding the continent is little changed over recent decades, although some ice loss has been occurring around the continent's peninsula and on some glaciers. Antarctica is significantly less tied to the world's weather patterns and is considered to be less subject to the effects of global warming so far.

The report drew concern from Rafe Pomerance, president of the environmental group Clean Air-Cool Planet. "This is another startling and serious indicator of massive changes in the Arctic due to climate change," he said in a statement. "It is one more reminder that we must address the global warming with a level of commitment and resources equal to the problem."

With the behavior of Arctic sea ice becoming an increasingly important issue, NASA is planning to launch a follow-on satellite mission, ICESat II, in 2015.

This new assertion appears to fly in face of a previous NASA study and a Nature study which said that "naturally" caused "unusual" winds blew out older thicker ice. See this page for an exactly opposite conclusion in peer-reviewed studies.

Excerpt from earlier study: "A second NASA team, using data from the GRACE (Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment) satellite, recently concluded that changes in the Arctic Oscillation were, "mostly decadal in nature," rather than driven by global warming."

It appears the alarmists are now claiming all natural climate events to be caused by warming. Notice how the scientist asserts global warming is causing the shift in Arctic oscillation despite the fact that he openly admits 'the dynamics are not yet understood.". Really? Then why assert warming is the cause if 'the dynamics are not yet understood'? How sad for science. To quote him again: "He said climate experts have concluded that the Arctic oscillation, which is a natural climate phenomenon, is also being modified by global warming. The dynamics are not yet understood, but it appears that higher temperatures in the tropics and elsewhere make it more likely that the oscillation will push icebergs down past Greenland and into the Atlantic."

By AR - Australian's are being stingy with their organs, apparently. Despite approximately 1 in 4 Australians registering as organ donors, only 198 people donated their organs last year.

But it stands to reason that Australia would be faced with an organ supply problem. The best organs come from healthy and relatively young people who die in hospital where surgeons can immediately harvest their organs upon death. The main source of healthy young people dying in this way would come from the road toll. Safe modern vehicles and effective drink-driving and speeding campaigns in recent years have reduced the road toll dramatically.

As Australia's population ages and our life-expectancy increases there will be even fewer suitable donors. Perhaps it is a good sign that there are not enough organs donated?

Thanks to JPost - The BBC has apologized for significant errors in two recent news reports on Israel. In a news item on March 7, following the Mercaz Harav Yeshiva attack, the BBC showed a bulldozer demolishing a house, while correspondent Nick Miles told viewers: "Hours after the attack, Israeli bulldozers destroyed his family home. Later, mourners set up Hamas and Islamic Jihad banners nearby." News anchor Geeta Guru-Murthy said: "Now, we would like to clarify a report we heard at this hour last Friday about the attack by a Palestinian gunman on a Jewish seminary in Jerusalem. In the report, the day after the attack, BBC World said that the gunman's home in east Jerusalem had been demolished by the Israeli authorities. That was not correct, and the images broadcast were of another demolition."

In other words, we lied, we knew we were lying, but we didn't care, it's only Jews we're bad mouthing and lying about, so who cares. Now we're just apologizing because we've been caught telling lies and have been shamed into admitting it.

In a second incident, in a news item entitled "Israel jets strike northern Gaza" on March 14 on their News Web site, the BBC reported that Israel was deliberately targeting civilians in an operation targeting Kassam rocket launch sites in Gaza, and claiming that the United Nations secretary-general had described it as an attack on civilians. Apologizing for the error, the BBC said in its response, regarding the speech: "We accept we should have made reference to what [Ban] said about Palestinian rocket attacks as well as to the 'excessive use of force' by Israel. We have amended the report, also removing the reference to Israeli 'attacks on civilians.'"

Once again, caught telling lies and smearing Israel again, you have to understand folks, they don't tell the truth that often, so it's very hard for the BBC to know the difference anymore. They have to be constantly shamed into doing the right thing, that nest of leftist vipers. Why the British taxpayer is forced to subsidize this morally bankrupt lot is beyond me. If the funding had been pulled, they most probably crash and burn amidst all the lies and half-truths and rightly so.

"...What we heard in Philadelphia was a slippery exercise in obfuscations and adroit evasions couched in obvious populist rhetoric. A desperate and transparent attempt to deflect the shocking facts that have fortunately emerged and have unquestionably betrayed their true cynical feelings about America, and their true cynical feelings about the White race and about the Jews. Quite simply, they hate this country, they hate what it stands for and they hate its history. They hate White people and they hate Jews. They admire our deadliest enemies, and they support their loathsome causes. And this, my friends, is a viable twenty-first century American presidential candidate."Radarsite

FOX News - President Nicolas Sarkozy said Friday that France will cut its nuclear arsenal to fewer than 300 warheads. France will reduce by one-third its airborne force of nuclear weapons, according to Sarkozy, leaving the nation with fewer than 300 warheads. Many of those are aboard submarines. Sarkozy said he is firmly committed to France's nuclear deterrent. He called it the nation's life insurance policy. But military spending needs to be re-examined, he added.

Since this is a peaceful, kumbaya-type gesture, I look forward to hearing of certain third-world dictatorships following the French example and also junking their pursuit of the big nasty nuke. After all we're always told that giving up our guns will mean world peace and utopia. On a different note, I'm glad France is letting go of some of its arsenal, but not for the usual kumbaya reasons though. The way I see it, this new/old Europe doesn't seem all that gung-ho and ready to kick ass if you will. What's the point of having all these fancy weapons if you're not prepared to use them when provoked. If you have a gun but are not prepared to use it, then you better turn it into a spade, lest you get shot in the ass with it by someone who is prepared to use it. Wouldn't want one of their nukes getting into the hands of those who are currently rioting, burning and ambushing police in France.

About

This blog is written solely by John Ray, who has a Ph.D. degree in psychology and 200+ papers published in the academic journals of the social sciences. It does occasionally comment on issues in psychology but is mainly aimed at giving a conservative psychologist's view on a broad range of topics. There are very few conservative psychologists. The blog originated in Australia and many (but not most) posts discuss Australian matters. Australians have an unusually good awareness of events outside their own country. Australian newspapers feature news from Britain and the USA not as an afterthought but as a major part of their coverage. So Australians do tend to have a truly Western heart, which is the reason behind the old name for this blog. So events in Australia, Britain and the USA all feature frequently here, plus occasional coverage of other places, particularly Israel.

A primer in American politics for non-Americans:

SCOTUS is the Supreme Court of the United States, the highest court in the land

The "GOP" stands for "Grand Old Party" and refers to the Republican party. The GOP is at present center/Right, while the Democrats have been undergoing a steady drift Leftwards and now have policies similar to mainstream European Leftist parties.

The ideological identity of both parties has however been very fluid -- almost reversing itself over time. In the mid 19th century, the GOP was the party of big government and concern for minorities while the Democrats advertised themselves as "The party of the white man" -- an orientation that lasted into the mid 20th century in the South. The Democrats are still obsessed with race but have now flipped into support for discrimination AGAINST whites.

Was Pope Urban VIII the first Warmist? Below we see him refusing to look through Galileo's telescope. People tend to refuse to consider evidence— if what they might discover contradicts what they believe.

Some brief observations about Leftism

As a good academic, I first define my terms: A Leftist is a person who is so dissatisfied with the way things naturally are that he/she is prepared to use force to make people behave in ways that they otherwise would not.

Leftists think that utopia can be coerced into existence -- so no dishonesty or brutality is beyond them in pursuit of that "noble" goal

Leftism is fundamentally authoritarian. Whether by revolution or by legislation, Leftists aim to change what people can and must do. When in 2008 Obama said that he wanted to "fundamentally transform" America, he was not talking about America's geography or topography but rather about American people. He wanted them to stop doing things that they wanted to do and make them do things that they did not want to do. Can you get a better definition of authoritarianism than that?

And note that an American President is elected to administer the law, not make it. That seems to have escaped Mr Obama

That Leftism is intrinsically authoritarian is not a new insight. It was well understood by none other than Friedrich Engels (Yes. THAT Engels). His excellent short essay On authority was written as a reproof to the dreamy Anarchist Left of his day. It concludes: "A revolution is certainly the most authoritarian thing there is; it is the act whereby one part of the population imposes its will upon the other part by means of rifles, bayonets and cannon — authoritarian means"

Evan Sayet: The Left sides "...invariably with evil over good, wrong over right, and the behaviors that lead to failure over those that lead to success." (t=5:35+ on video)

Some useful definitions:

If a conservative doesn't like guns, he doesn't buy one. If a liberal doesn't like guns, he wants all guns outlawed. If a conservative is a vegetarian, he doesn't eat meat. If a liberal is a vegetarian, he wants all meat products banned for everyone. If a conservative is down-and-out, he thinks about how to better his situation. A liberal wonders who is going to take care of him. If a conservative doesn't like a talk show host, he switches channels. Liberals demand that those they don't like be shut down. If a conservative is a non-believer, he doesn't go to church. A liberal non-believer wants any mention of God and religion silenced. (Unless it's a foreign religion, of course!) If a conservative decides he needs health care, he goes about shopping for it, or may choose a job that provides it. A liberal demands that the rest of us pay for his.

Death taxes: You would expect a conscientious person, of whatever degree of intelligence, to reflect on the strange contradiction involved in denying people the right to unearned wealth, while supporting programs that give people unearned wealth.

America is no longer the land of the free. It is now the land of the regulated -- though it is not alone in that, of course

Envy is a strong and widespread human emotion so there has alway been widespread support for policies of economic "levelling". Both the USA and the modern-day State of Israel were founded by communists but reality taught both societies that respect for the individual gave much better outcomes than levelling ideas. Sadly, there are many people in both societies in whom hatred for others is so strong that they are incapable of respect for the individual. The destructiveness of what they support causes them to call themselves many names in different times and places but they are the backbone of the political Left

The large number of rich Leftists suggests that, for them, envy is secondary. They are directly driven by hatred and scorn for many of the other people that they see about them. Hatred of others can be rooted in many things, not only in envy. But the haters come together as the Left.

Leftists hate the world around them and want to change it: the people in it most particularly. Conservatives just want to be left alone to make their own decisions and follow their own values.

The failure of the Soviet experiment has definitely made the American Left more vicious and hate-filled than they were. The plain failure of what passed for ideas among them has enraged rather than humbled them.

Ronald Reagan famously observed that the status quo is Latin for “the mess we’re in.” So much for the vacant Leftist claim that conservatives are simply defenders of the status quo. They think that conservatives are as lacking in principles as they are.

The shallow thinkers of the Left sometimes claim that conservatives want to impose their own will on others in the matter of abortion. To make that claim is however to confuse religion with politics. Conservatives are in fact divided about their response to abortion. The REAL opposition to abortion is religious rather than political. And the church which has historically tended to support the LEFT -- the Roman Catholic church -- is the most fervent in the anti-abortion cause. Conservatives are indeed the one side of politics to have moral qualms on the issue but they tend to seek a middle road in dealing with it. Taking the issue to the point of legal prohibitions is a religious doctrine rather than a conservative one -- and the religion concerned may or may not be characteristically conservative. More on that here

The Leftist hunger for change to the society that they hate leads to a hunger for control over other people. And they will do and say anything to get that control: "Power at any price". Leftist politicians are mostly self-aggrandizing crooks who gain power by deceiving the uninformed with snake-oil promises -- power which they invariably use to destroy. Destruction is all that they are good at. Destruction is what haters do.

Leftists are consistent only in their hate. They don't have principles. How can they when "there is no such thing as right and wrong"? All they have is postures, pretend-principles that can be changed as easily as one changes one's shirt

A Leftist assumption: Making money doesn't entitle you to it, but wanting money does.

"Politicians never accuse you of 'greed' for wanting other people's money -- only for wanting to keep your own money." --columnist Joe Sobran (1946-2010)

I often wonder why Leftists refer to conservatives as "wingnuts". A wingnut is a very useful device that adds versatility wherever it is used. Clearly, Leftists are not even good at abuse. Once they have accused their opponents of racism and Nazism, their cupboard is bare. Similarly, Leftists seem to think it is a devastating critique to refer to "Worldnet Daily" as "Worldnut Daily". The poverty of their argumentation is truly pitiful

The Leftist assertion that there is no such thing as right and wrong has a distinguished history. It was Pontius Pilate who said "What is truth?" (John 18:38). From a Christian viewpoint, the assertion is undoubtedly the Devil's gospel

"If one rejects laissez faire on account of man's fallibility and moral weakness, one must for the same reason also reject every kind of government action." - Ludwig von Mises

Because of their need to be different from the mainstream, Leftists are very good at pretending that sow's ears are silk purses

Among people who should know better, Leftism is a character defect. Leftists HATE success in others -- which is why notably successful societies such as the USA and Israel are hated and failures such as the Palestinians can do no wrong.

A Leftist's beliefs are all designed to pander to his ego. So when you have an argument with a Leftist, you are not really discussing the facts. You are threatening his self esteem. Which is why the normal Leftist response to challenge is mere abuse.

Because of the fragility of a Leftist's ego, anything that threatens it is intolerable and provokes rage. So most Leftist blogs can be summarized in one sentence: "How DARE anybody question what I believe!". Rage and abuse substitute for an appeal to facts and reason.

Their threatened egos sometimes drive Leftists into quite desperate flights from reality. For instance, they often call Israel an "Apartheid state" -- when it is in fact the Arab states that practice Apartheid -- witness the severe restrictions on Christians in Saudi Arabia. There are no such restrictions in Israel.

Because their beliefs serve their ego rather than reality, Leftists just KNOW what is good for us. Conservatives need evidence.

“Absolute certainty is the privilege of uneducated men and fanatics.” -- C.J. Keyser

"Almost all professors of the arts and sciences are egregiously conceited, and derive their happiness from their conceit" -- Erasmus

THE FALSIFICATION OF HISTORY HAS DONE MORE TO IMPEDE HUMAN DEVELOPMENT THAN ANY ONE THING KNOWN TO MANKIND -- ROUSSEAU

"Seest thou a man wise in his own conceit? there is more hope of a fool than of him" (Proverbs 26: 12). I think that sums up Leftists pretty well.

Eminent British astrophysicist Sir Arthur Stanley Eddington is often quoted as saying: "Not only is the universe stranger than we imagine, it is stranger than we can imagine." It was probably in fact said by his contemporary, J.B.S. Haldane. But regardless of authorship, it could well be a conservative credo not only about the cosmos but also about human beings and human society. Mankind is too complex to be summed up by simple rules and even complex rules are only approximations with many exceptions.

Politics is the only thing Leftists know about. They know nothing of economics, history or business. Their only expertise is in promoting feelings of grievance

Socialism makes the individual the slave of the state – capitalism frees them.

MESSAGE to Leftists: Even if you killed all conservatives tomorrow, you would just end up in another Soviet Union. Conservatives are all that stand between you and that dismal fate.

Many readers here will have noticed that what I say about Leftists sometimes sounds reminiscent of what Leftists say about conservatives. There is an excellent reason for that. Leftists are great "projectors" (people who see their own faults in others). So a good first step in finding out what is true of Leftists is to look at what they say about conservatives! They even accuse conservatives of projection (of course).

The research shows clearly that one's Left/Right stance is strongly genetically inherited but nobody knows just what specifically is inherited. What is inherited that makes people Leftist or Rightist? There is any amount of evidence that personality traits are strongly genetically inherited so my proposal is that hard-core Leftists are people who tend to let their emotions (including hatred and envy) run away with them and who are much more in need of seeing themselves as better than others -- two attributes that are probably related to one another. Such Leftists may be an evolutionary leftover from a more primitive past.

Leftists seem to believe that if someone like Al Gore says it, it must be right. They obviously have a strong need for an authority figure. The fact that the two most authoritarian regimes of the 20th century (Nazi Germany and Soviet Russia) were socialist is thus no surprise. Leftists often accuse conservatives of being "authoritarian" but that is just part of their usual "projective" strategy -- seeing in others what is really true of themselves.

"Why should the German be interested in the liberation of the Jew, if the Jew is not interested in the liberation of the German?... We recognize in Judaism, therefore, a general anti-social element of the present time... In the final analysis, the emancipation of the Jews is the emancipation of mankind from Judaism.... Indeed, in North America, the practical domination of Judaism over the Christian world has achieved as its unambiguous and normal expression that the preaching of the Gospel itself and the Christian ministry have become articles of trade... Money is the jealous god of Israel, in face of which no other god may exist". Who said that? Hitler? No. It was Karl Marx. See also here and here and here. For roughly two centuries now, antisemitism has, throughout the Western world, been principally associated with Leftism (including the socialist Hitler) -- as it is to this day. See here.

Leftists call their hatred of Israel "Anti-Zionism" but Zionists are only a small minority in Israel

Some of the Leftist hatred of Israel is motivated by old-fashioned antisemitism (beliefs in Jewish "control" etc.) but most of it is just the regular Leftist hatred of success in others. And because the societies they inhabit do not give them the vast amount of recognition that their large but weak egos need, some of the most virulent haters of Israel and America live in those countries. So the hatred is the product of pathologically high self-esteem.

"With their infernal racial set-asides, racial quotas, and race norming, liberals share many of the Klan's premises. The Klan sees the world in terms of race and ethnicity. So do liberals! Indeed, liberals and white supremacists are the only people left in America who are neurotically obsessed with race. Conservatives champion a color-blind society" -- Ann Coulter

Who said this in 1968? "I am not, and never have been, a man of the right. My position was on the Left and is now in the centre of politics". It was Sir Oswald Mosley, founder and leader of the British Union of Fascists

The term "Fascism" is mostly used by the Left as a brainless term of abuse. But when they do make a serious attempt to define it, they produce very complex and elaborate definitions -- e.g. here and here. In fact, Fascism is simply extreme socialism plus nationalism. But great gyrations are needed to avoid mentioning the first part of that recipe, of course.

Politicians are in general only a little above average in intelligence so the idea that they can make better decisions for us that we can make ourselves is laughable

A quote from the late Dr. Adrian Rogers, 1931–2005: "You cannot legislate the poor into freedom by legislating the wealthy out of freedom. What one person receives without working for, another person must work for without receiving. The government cannot give to anybody anything that the government does not first take from somebody else. When half of the people get the idea that they do not have to work because the other half is going to take care of them, and when the other half gets the idea that it does no good to work because somebody else is going to get what they work for, that my dear friend, is about the end of any nation. You cannot multiply wealth by dividing it."

A lesson in Australian: When an Australian calls someone a "big-noter", he is saying that the person is a chronic and rather pathetic seeker of admiration -- as in someone who often pulls out "big notes" (e.g. $100.00 bills) to pay for things, thus endeavouring to create the impression that he is rich. The term describes the mentality rather than the actual behavior with money and it aptly describes many Leftists. When they purport to show "compassion" by advocating things that cost themselves nothing (e.g. advocating more taxes on "the rich" to help "the poor"), an Australian might say that the Leftist is "big-noting himself". There is an example of the usage here. The term conveys contempt. There is a wise description of Australians generally here

Heritage is what survives death: Very rare and hence very valuable

Two lines below of a famous hymn that would be incomprehensible to Leftists today ("honor"? "right"? "freedom?" Freedom to agree with them is the only freedom they believe in)

First to fight for right and freedom,
And to keep our honor clean

It is of course the hymn of the USMC -- still today the relentless warriors that they always were.

If any of the short observations above about Leftism seem wrong, note that they do not stand alone. The evidence for them is set out at great length in a MONOGRAPH on Leftism.

You can email me (John Ray) here (Hotmail address). In emailing me, you can address me as "John", "Jon", "Dr. Ray" or "JR" and that will be fine -- but my preference is for "JR"

There are also two blogspot blogs which record what I think are my main recent articles here and here. Similar content can be more conveniently accessed via my subject-indexed list of short articles here or here (I rarely write long articles these days)